Hi, I just put together this computer in the past week(was using a stock cooler until I got my Hyper 212 Push-Pull set up). The whole thing took me a week plus to put together mainly because the PH-TC14PE installation was a nightmare, I just couldn't get the mounting working for me sold the sink without the fan to a friend and got myself a Hyper 212 Evo which came in today:

For detailed about every single item, here:I will list it here for those who don't want to look through that link:

Get the FTW edition of the GTX 670, only $20 more and way better. Uses a GTX 680 PCB, comes oc'd to the performance of a 680, and it's totally silent. Just awesome, worth way more than the $20 premium.

Stock cooling would suffice if you're not oc'ing but a quality cooler never hurts. If you want to save some green go for a cheaper cooler, a Cooler Master Hyper 212 Evo does an amazing job, not silent but quiet, and it's only like $30.

The NZXT Phantom case you chose is certainly decent if you prefer that sort of look. Looking at pictures and specs, I don't see any glaring red flags. It may be good to google a review or two. That case is clearly designed for maximum airflow and not for super quiet operation...just so you're aware.

Stock Intel coolers are designed to be sufficient to cool their processors at stock speeds in the wide variety of cases on the market. They generally favor quieter operation at the expense of a little higher temperature, but obviously not beyond the limits of the processor. A tower-style heatsink like the Cooler Master Hyper 212 Evo for $30 will get you both quiter operation and lower temps across the board, but is not "required." If you're bumping up against your budget at the moment, you can forego the aftermarket cooler for now and see where that gets you. You can undervolt Ivy Bridge a bit at stock speeds and still maintain stability while lowering temps a bit also.

By all means the Cooler Master 212 Evo is well worth the $40. I have an Antec 900 and 900 V3 and to be honest I didnt like working with either one of them, they both felt a bit cramped. If you like a blingy case with lights The CoolerMaster HAF series are easy to work in, I have two 922's and actually prefer them to the Antec cases I mentioned earlier. I second spending the extra $20 on the EVGA FTW 670, I have it and it's the first card that I spent over $250 on since the 8800 GTX's that I bought back in 06

1. If you're not overclocking, don't get a K, and you don't need a cooler. If you are, get the Hyper 212 Evo mentioned above, or a Corsair H80, which is the quietest integrated water-cooler when set to Low (still good enough to run a 5.0GHz overclock).

2. If you're not overclocking and you never want dual-GPUs, you don't need to spend more than ~$100 on a motherboard. The cheapest Asus/ASRock/Gigabyte will be great, in that order. If you are overclocking, you have the perfect board.

3. Get the FTW or higher- OR, if you're getting a more open-air case, a good Asus/Gigabyte/MSI with aftermarket cooling, in that order.

4. If you think that you might need more than 1TB, get a bigger drive. Even the Green drives are fast enough to run 95% of your games, and anything else can just be moved to the SSD- I've written a guide for that, and it's fast and easy.

5. You can get a Blu-ray reader for less than a burner, which is the route I'd recommend.

6. Integrated audio is pretty good if you're not using a real set of cans- otherwise, you'll just use digital output. Put a sound card in your future plans along with a good set of headphones, they go hand in hand.

7. Your case is intensely personal- I lean more towards quiet, understated enclosures and build towards making a silent system personally, but NZXT makes quality stuff. The Corsair stuff isn't over-priced if you need to work in your machine often of course. Thing is, literally anything will work if you can get quiet fans installed with filters in front of them and more intake than exhaust to keep the dust out. If the CPU, GPU, PSU, and drives are already quiet, then the system won't be audible. The case I'm using right now has just been upgraded to the Fractal Design Define R4, and it rocks your socks. Newegg is even shipping them out for $109. Configuring it would be trivial- just move the included rear 140mm fan to the front, put an H80 or additional 140mm fan on the rear if you use the Hyper 212 Evo or stock cooler, throw in any GPU and call it done. Sharp, small, silent, and extremely flexible.

8. You don't need 650W. Hell, you don't need 450W; just get the quietest PSU you can find that has two 6+2pin PCIe connectors and call it good.

Thanks for the reply guys(especially Airmantharp with the best all around response), I have decided to get the GTX670 FTW and the Cooler Master Hyper 212 Evo for $30(optional, might skip this if I need it to upgrade another hardware), so as far as CPU-CPUFan-Case( will take a look for Tom's $80-120 case review and google a few more but NZXT Phantom 410 is definately the 1 seed for now) I am set. I might not overclock too much this year but I want to keep that option open down the road.

Now onto the next part of my build:Is Corsair Force Series 3 240GB the best price/capacity/reliablity SSD combo(240-256 g range) or should I consider Samsung 830 for the extra 16G/Intel 520 for the extra warranty/reliability at a $40 premium?

Last edited by sherlock on Tue Aug 07, 2012 9:37 pm, edited 1 time in total.

sherlock wrote:Thanks for the reply guys, I have decided to get the GTX670 FTW and the Cooler Master Hyper 212 Evo for $30(optional, might skip this if I need it to upgrade another hardware), so as far as CPU-CPUFan-Case( will take a look for Tom's $80-120 case review and google a few more but NZXT Phantom 410 is definately the 1 seed for now) I am set.

Now onto the next part of my build:

Is my Motherboard good enough, is it the best I could do in the <$200 range?

Is Corsair Force Series 3 240GB the best price/capacity/reliablity SSD combo(240-256 g range) or should I consider Samsung 830 for the extra 16G/Intel 520 for the extra warranty/reliability at a $40 premium?

Wow, that's one ugly cheep looking case... BUT that's my aesthetic opinion- internally it's about as good as you can get. I'd just be worried about busting up all that plastic over time. It's the same price shipped as the Define R4 I linked above.

Motherboard -> if you're not pushing the overclock and you're not running dual GPUs, it actually almost doesn't matter. You could even get an mATX board and a smaller case. There is no 'best' here, just 'best' for your purpose and price point. 'Better' boards have more extra features (more ports), better overclocking stability, and better support for 2+ GPUs.

Corsair's SSD implementations are top notch, but your focus should be on the controller- i.e., Sandforce 2, Marvell, Samsung, etc. Samsung's 830's come out on top for desktop usage, Sandforce 2 for workstation/server usage (high transaction rates), and Marvell is usually the budget option. Thing is, you won't be able to tell the difference, so the cheapest SATA3 drive you can get gets my recommendation. Also, consider dropping the size down if you need to make some room in your budget. You want the OS on it, but beyond that it'll just be for games. You can easily put everything else on the HDD.

Alright, so I guess both the Motherboard and SSD is OK, I did a search on newegg for what I am at budget wise so farTotal Budget: 2KReserved for Windows 7 64bit +Keyboard+ Shipping/Tax-> $200Main Budget 1.8K

GTG = Grey to GreyWhat is your reasoning behind wanting a 120Hz monitor? Are you wanting to do 3-D gaming? Otherwise, with 5ms, you wont notice any ghosting while gaming. Check out this e-IPS monitor. With IPS you get superior color accuracy and viewing angles, generally they tend to have slightly slower response times, but that one I linked is 5ms which should be plenty.

Last edited by DPete27 on Tue Aug 07, 2012 10:42 pm, edited 2 times in total.

sherlock wrote:Is Corsair Force Series 3 240GB the best price/capacity/reliablity SSD combo(240-256 g range) or should I consider Samsung 830 for the extra 16G/Intel 520 for the extra warranty/reliability at a $40 premium?

You should consider the Samsung 830 for it's overall great performance, if the price is right

sherlock wrote:Is Corsair Force Series 3 240GB the best price/capacity/reliablity SSD combo(240-256 g range) or should I consider Samsung 830 for the extra 16G/Intel 520 for the extra warranty/reliability at a $40 premium?[/b]

I am getting sick of RMA'ing Sandforce drives. It almost doesn't matter who makes them - Failure rates (for me) are in the 20% range now and I reckon I've installed more than 100 SSD's in the last four or five years.

Either the Samsung or the Intel have much better track records. I've never had to return any of the intels I've installed, and the general consensus is that the Samsungs are reliable.

Some people ask me why I have always enclosed my signature in spoiler tags; There is a good reason for that, but I can't elaborate without giving away the plot twist.

I consulted a few PC Gamers at symthic.com and they say for me to play on 64 player maps with high or above setting on a 120Hz monitor will need significant Overclocking(say 4.2 GHz and higher). I think the CoolMaster Evo212 might not be good enough for what I will need in that case, Should I get a liquid cooler like Corsair H80 or a air cooler like Zalman CNPS12X, both in the $100 range? They also mentioned i5 2500K(SB) is superior in OC to I5 3570K(IB), is that true and is it significantly different? I'd love to save the 18W with IB and I heard IB manage Ram better somewhere but if 2500K is significantly better in OC I might switch to that.

I just got the SanDisk Extreme SDSSDX-240G-G25 2.5" 240GB SATA III Internal Solid State Drive (SSD) for $190 delivered in 3 days from eBay--lower than newegg--and there are now even lower prices on it...I think without much effort you could get a better price for a comparable SSD below your current budget.

Neutronbeam wrote:I just got the SanDisk Extreme SDSSDX-240G-G25 2.5" 240GB SATA III Internal Solid State Drive (SSD) for $190 delivered in 3 days from eBay--lower than newegg--and there are now even lower prices on it...I think without much effort you could get a better price for a comparable SSD below your current budget.

Yeah I agree, just using newegg price as a reference, I am not planning on building a 100% new chicken .

After some researching into 120Hz and how much OC you have to do to make them worth their price, I think I will layoff them for now. I will get a good cooler maybe in the $100 range( or is $35 CoolMaster Hyper Evo212 or $40 Thermalright Spirit good enough for say below 4.1 Ghz OCing?) for future OCing but get a 60Hz monitor instead. That should gave me enough saving for 27"(instead of 24") monitor/BR burner/Better SSD(Samsung or Intel520)/Mouse.

Last edited by sherlock on Wed Aug 08, 2012 10:25 am, edited 1 time in total.

The Ivy bridge 3570K gets hotter more quickly during overclocking and will be more difficult to cool when pushed.By contrast, I had 4.8GHz out of a 2500K using the stock cooler before my Noctua heatsink adapter arrived in the mail. 5GHz on air is not uncommon for 2500K's but you should also be prepared to find one that's difficult to get over 4.5GHz. Overclocking is a crapshoot and you might get unlucky.

Ivy Bridge is faster than Sandy Bridge clock for clock but in games the advantage is only around 5%.I would take a 2500K at 4.5GHz over a 3570K at 4.5GHz. The 2500K will likely do that on stock voltage whilst the 3570K will need a voltage bump for definite and some serious cooling to match.

Some people ask me why I have always enclosed my signature in spoiler tags; There is a good reason for that, but I can't elaborate without giving away the plot twist.

I have settled on CoolerMaster Hyper Evo212 as the Cooler and a 60Hz screen, after some discussion in the OC forum seems like 212 is good enough for what i need to do. Now I need some help on the motherboard/SSD/Monitor area:

Mobo:

I like my current version: Asus P8Z77-V LK, but is there a board in the $100-$200 range that offers better than standard Ethernet Port? Say a Bigfoot Network Killer Lag Reducing Port(or are those not worth the money?

Monitor:The IPS panel linked in the Summer System article are more expensive than 120Hz monitors which is too much for my current budget, what is the best value for a 24" 60Hz level monitor in the below 300-350 range?

sherlock wrote:I have settled on CoolerMaster Hyper Evo212 as the Cooler and a 60Hz screen, after some discussion in the OC forum seems like 212 is good enough for what i need to do. Now I need some help on the motherboard/SSD/Monitor area:

Mobo:

I like my current version: Asus P8Z77-V LK, but is there a board in the $100-$200 range that offers better than standard Ethernet Port? Say a Bigfoot Network Killer Lag Reducing Port(or are those not worth the money?

Monitor:The IPS panel linked in the Summer System article are more expensive than 120Hz monitors which is too much for my current budget, what is the best value for a 24" 60Hz level monitor in the below 300-350 range?

The mobo you have listed was recommended in the TR Summer Guide, I personally have it in one of my systems and it's a good board. If your looking for a board with something other than a Realtek NIC , your probably going to have to go to ASUS Pro line of boards , they start around $200 and go up.SSD: Take a dart and choose on the dartboard which one you want, Samsung 830 seem to be the rage now, I have 1 128GB version along with a Crucial M4 and cant tell any difference between them speed wise.

sherlock wrote:I have settled on CoolerMaster Hyper Evo212 as the Cooler and a 60Hz screen, after some discussion in the OC forum seems like 212 is good enough for what i need to do. Now I need some help on the motherboard/SSD/Monitor area:

Mobo:

I like my current version: Asus P8Z77-V LK, but is there a board in the $100-$200 range that offers better than standard Ethernet Port? Say a Bigfoot Network Killer Lag Reducing Port(or are those not worth the money?

Monitor:The IPS panel linked in the Summer System article are more expensive than 120Hz monitors which is too much for my current budget, what is the best value for a 24" 60Hz level monitor in the below 300-350 range?

The mobo you have listed was recommended in the TR Summer Guide, I personally have it in one of my systems and it's a good board. If your looking for a board with something other than a Realtek NIC , your probably going to have to go to ASUS Pro line of boards , they start around $200 and go up.SSD: Take a dart and choose on the dartboard which one you want, Samsung 830 seem to be the rage now, I have 1 128GB version along with a Crucial M4 and cant tell any difference between them speed wise.

1) I wouldn't worry about some super Ethernet port, those are geared toward professional gamers and even then its no excuse for skill. If you want the best of the batch, you're looking at higher end mobos like Asus' Republic of Gamers' Maximus V Gene. There is a massive ROG Review at anandtech.com thats based on the X79 chipset, but I would say everything is transferrable to Z77. You might have to face the music and look at how many add-on cards you're actually going to put in this system and you might find an mATX board suits your needs just fine?

2) Samsung 830 vs Intel 520: Choice is yours. I would say the Samsung is plenty reliable and you wont notice the performance difference between the two without looking at benchmark scores. Flip a coin or choose whichever is cheaper.

3) With an i5-3570K, you're sitting at the top of the pile as far as gaming CPUs go. How can you believe someone that tells you you'll need to overclock the piss out of that processor to handle ANY game. There are thousands of people around the world playing BF3 multiplayer just fine with lesser CPUs. That being said, from what I've read, you should be able to get ~4.4GHz on a 3570K without any voltage bump. Generally the 2500K has a slightly higher max overclock, but the 3570K has better per-clock performance, so they pretty much cancel eachother out. Furthermore, Ivy has native USB3.0 support and PCIe3.0 whereas Sandy doesn't.

4) If you know any college students, check with them about Windows licenses. My brother was able to buy me one from his university for $30.

Thanks for the suggestions DPete. 1. I agree, this motherboard should be good enough.2. After reading newegg reviews and considering the extra G & $ 830 is my choice.3. Yeah, I probably thought too much about that.4. Just graduated(Bad Timing LMAO), I will phone a few of my firends still in school to see.

All that's left is whether I should get a lower Wattage PSU (650W might be overkill and I am not SLIing in the future), a HDD(this imo can wait), a BRay Burner(ditto), a gaming mouse+pad and maybe a few 120mm fans for my extra fan mounts on the NZXT Phantom 410(I heard those are cheap) for the $146 I have left and probably another 50 extra in the reserve budget?

sherlock wrote:4. Just graduated(Bad Timing LMAO), I will phone a few of my firends still in school to see.

Employee Purchase Program (EPP)? Might still be able to steal a chaper price.

All that's left is whether I should get a lower Wattage PSU (650W might be overkill and I am not SLIing in the future), a HDD(this imo can wait), a BRay Burner(ditto), a gaming mouse+pad and maybe a few 120mm fans for my extra fan mounts on the NZXT Phantom 410(I heard those are cheap) for the $146 I have left and probably another 50 extra in the reserve budget?

Just make sure that your PSU can still source enough current and has the connectors for your GPU and you should be alright.

As for other stuff, though, you should look into a mechanical keyboard...people around here are having a love affair with them, including myself

"A life is like a garden. Perfect moments can be had, but not preserved, except in memory. LLAP"

sherlock wrote:4. Just graduated(Bad Timing LMAO), I will phone a few of my firends still in school to see.

Employee Purchase Program (EPP)? Might still be able to steal a chaper price.

My company is rather small and don't offer such program, I looked up the student discount page and you can only get Win 7 Professional($65 download) &+$15 for backup disks so that's $80, I can get $80 Win7 HP on Ebay with free shipping and not having to pay my friends for shipping. Seem like Microsoft closed the cheap Win7 HP for student loophole.

p.s there are few places selling HP upgrade disks for about $45 but I don't want to gamble on the chance of them not working on a clean installation.

Nobody needs a backup disk anymore. You'll get the download as an ISO file which you can store anywhere, then put it on a flash drive and install. It installs more than twice as fast off a flash drive anyway. Besides, all you really need is the key, you can use anybody's disc as long as its the same version as the key you have.

DPete27 wrote:Nobody needs a backup disk anymore. You'll get the download as an ISO file which you can store anywhere, then put it on a flash drive and install. It installs more than twice as fast off a flash drive anyway. Besides, all you really need is the key, you can use anybody's disc as long as its the same version as the key you have.

Nice, Are you sure clean install is possible with just the ISO? I just grduated so I still have a active .edu email, so I probably should try to get it myself, at $65 it is still good value, worst come to worst I will have my friends still in school download it and give to me in a USB.

Edit: I got it from Microsoft, I saved the Key in a Word file and wrote it down, will save the iso on my computer, burn on a DVD and copy onto a USB. Just need some more research with clean install with ISO and I will be set.

Shipping: CPU(free)+Mobo(7.49)+Ram(Free)+Graphic(Free)+SSD(Free)+DVD Burner(4.99)+Enclosure(9.99)+CPUFan(Free)+Monitor(Free)=22.5, $10-$20(shipping included) keyboard is all the rage on ebay so I will just reserve $20 for it, this leaves me with an extra 87.5 spilling into the main budget:

New Total free money: 250.5

Hmm, That's plenty for me to get Mouse, BR burner and a decent HDD with leftover I could either get a fancier keyboard or save.

You could save a good bit on the PSU. The HX's nice, and modular PSUs are cool, but with a fairly large case that mounts the PSU in the bottom (like the Phantom 410), you can easily tuck the cables away. The SeaSonic S12ii 520 is just $60 with promo code SSPSU15 right now.

Also, a funny thing about me: I own a $240 case, but when I talk about other people's build I suddenly become a cheapskate, and say stuff like: "if you don't mind the lack of USB 3.0 in the front, that $45 Zalman Z9 seems like a pretty good deal"

1. Get the lower-power PSU suggested above. Same or better quality, better price, no difference in your build- it could even handle a second GTX670 later without breaking a sweat.2. Consider this HP monitor instead of the Dell. I'm not really an HP (or Dell!) fan, but if you're going to get an IPS screen for gaming, don't get one with all of the extra inputs- they require a scaler, which means increased input lag across the board. The HP, when measured electronically, has none. Also, that Dell is a 6-bit monitor that fakes 8-bit, while the HP is a real 8-bit panel.3. On the overclocking and cooling debate- Intel's stock cooler is good for at least 4.0GHz at stock voltage without becoming a nuisance. The Hyper 212 Evo is actually overkill for a moderate overclock in the 4.4GHz-4.6GHz range, so as long as you keep voltage within 110% of stock you'll be fine. If you want more cooling, spring for the Corsair H80 and run it on low. It's about as quiet as you can get for the performance and it gets the heat out of your case.

Airmantharp wrote:Going through your list again, I only have two suggestions:

1. Get the lower-power PSU suggested above. Same or better quality, better price, no difference in your build- it could even handle a second GTX670 later without breaking a sweat.2. Consider this HP monitor instead of the Dell. I'm not really an HP (or Dell!) fan, but if you're going to get an IPS screen for gaming, don't get one with all of the extra inputs- they require a scaler, which means increased input lag across the board. The HP, when measured electronically, has none. Also, that Dell is a 6-bit monitor that fakes 8-bit, while the HP is a real 8-bit panel.3. On the overclocking and cooling debate- Intel's stock cooler is good for at least 4.0GHz at stock voltage without becoming a nuisance. The Hyper 212 Evo is actually overkill for a moderate overclock in the 4.4GHz-4.6GHz range, so as long as you keep voltage within 110% of stock you'll be fine. If you want more cooling, spring for the Corsair H80 and run it on low. It's about as quiet as you can get for the performance and it gets the heat out of your case.

Thanks for the monitor recommendation, I will do some more reserach into 24" IPS LEDs but that one looks good and the price is better than newegg/Amazon/Ebay.

p.s What should I do with newegg customer reviews, how much should I trust them? Is it skewed toward the one egg reviews b/c most people who are happy with their product don't bother to post reviews?